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Archaeologists: England’s Stonehenge Was a Burial Ground

Washington Post: The secret of Stonehenge has been solved: The mysterious circle of large stones in southern England was a burial ground for almost five centuries, and probably holds the remains of a family that long ruled the area, new research concludes.

Based on radiocarbon dating of cremated bones up to 5,000 years old, researchers with the Stonehenge Riverside Project said they are convinced the area was built and then grew as a “domain of the ancestors.”

“It’s now clear that burials were a major component of Stonehenge in all its main stages,” said Mike Parker Pearson, archaeology professor at the University of Sheffield in England and head of the project. “Stonehenge was a place of burial from its beginning to its zenith in the mid-third millennium B.C.”

The finding marks a major re-thinking of Stonehenge, which in the past was believed to be a burial site for only a century. A combination of the radiocarbon dating; excavations nearby that have revealed a once-thriving “domain of the living;” and the fact that the number of cremated remains appeared to grow over a 500-year period convinced researchers that the site was used for a long time and most likely was a burial ground for one ruling family.